Scientific FRAUD!
Recent examples of misconduct within the sciences should act as a warning to all of us
‘‘It would be difficult to think of a more brazen example of a scientific conflict of interest if you tried!’’
Three cases of scientific misconduct have made the news recently which stood out to me.
Marine Ecology Misconduct!
Landmark Dementia Study and its’ Doctored Images
Conflict of Interest within the Dietary Guidelines Committee
These cases really got me thinking about our ever-increasing reliance on ‘The Science’…. and the danger that comes along with it.
1. Marine Ecology Misconduct!
In early August, 2022, the University of Delaware found marine ecologist, Danielle Dixson, guilty of research misconduct after committing ‘fabrication and falsification’ in work on fish behavior and coral reefs.
An investigative panel’s review ‘paints a damning picture of Dixson’s scientific work’ according to an article about the controversy published in Science.org.
Dixson conducted numerous studies that appeared to show how rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere can have ‘dramatic effects on fish behavior and ecology’. Her later work focused on coral reef ecology.
One such example is that of Dixson’s 2014 paper which showed that over-fished, seaweed-covered reefs in Fiji fail to attract juvenile individuals of 15 fish and three coral species.
Quoting from the Science.org article:
‘The committee calculated that to produce the paper’s data, which Dixson said she had collected herself, she would have had to carry out 12,920 fluming trials, generating some 860,000 data points and taking 1,194 hours of observation time… requiring 11,628 liters of sea water to flow through the flume, which the draft report says she had to collect 2 kilometers from the shore. “It is highly unlikely that she had the time available to do all the experiments and trials as detailed in the paper,” the panel wrote.’ Science.org 2022
Moreover, the raw data within Excel files was;
‘riddled with inexplicably duplicated columns… with errors present such that the results presented in the publication could not have been generated from these files.’ Science.org 2022
The findings of the investigation and the retraction of a number of Dixson’s papers from the journal within which they were published have at the very least cast serious doubt over her research findings.
It should be noted that, according to Science.org, Dixson;
“adamantly denies any and all allegations of wrongdoing, and will vigorously appeal any finding of research misconduct.’’ Science.org, 2022
2. Landmark Dementia Study and its’ Doctored Images
An influential study published in Nature in 2006 first authored by neuroscientist, Sylvain Lesné of the University of Minnesota (UMN), underpins a key part of the dominant ‘amyloid hypothesis’ of Alzheimer’s. It claims that ‘Aβ clumps’ (plaques) in brain tissue are a primary cause of Alzheimer’s. Lesné and his colleagues discovered an Aβ sub-type and seemed to prove it caused dementia in rats.
However, a leading independent image analyst and several top Alzheimer’s researchers cast doubt on more than 70 images in Lesné’s papers.
Quoting from the Science.org website who published a bombshell piece on this story in July 2022:
‘‘Some look like ‘shockingly blatant’ examples of image tampering, says Donna Wilcock, an Alzheimer’s expert at the University of Kentucky.’
‘‘The authors ‘appeared to have composed figures by piecing together parts of photos from different experiments,’ says Elisabeth Bik, a molecular biologist and well-known forensic image consultant.’’
“The obtained experimental results might not have been the desired results, and that data might have been changed to … better fit a hypothesis.”
The implications of these faked images, if proved to be true, are profound.
Some Alzheimer’s experts now suspect Lesné’s studies have misdirected Alzheimer’s research for the last 16 years!
It would be difficult to overstate the magnitude of waste; millions of wasted man-hours; countless billions of dollars; not to mention the misleading of countless patients and loved ones who are impacted by the condition.
‘‘The immediate, obvious damage is wasted NIH funding and wasted thinking in the field because people are using these results as a starting point for their own experiments.’’ Thomas Sudhof, Stanford University, quoted in Science.org.
3. Conflict of Interest within the U.S. Dietary Guidelines Committee
Another recent story to emerge was the revelation that 95% of the 2020 Dietary Guidelines for Americans committee had conflicts of interest within the food and pharmaceutical industries. These are the people who basically set influential guidelines on what hundreds of millions of Americans should eat.. so any potential conflicts should be taken VERY seriously.
Committee members were shown to have ties to companies such as Kraft, Kellogg's, General Mills, Abbott, and others. It would be difficult to think of a more brazen example of a scientific conflict of interest if you tried!
The report that revealed the conflict of interest can be found here.
Be Careful Who You Trust!
I have highlighted just the most recent cases of scientific misconduct in this newsletter but of course there are no shortage of examples to choose from.
For instance, it seems almost forgotten now that in 2009 Pfizer, the worlds largest drug company, paid the LARGEST CRIMINAL FINE IN HISTORY as part of a $2.3bn settlement for mis-promoting medicines and for paying kickbacks to ‘compliant doctors’. In other words bribery and corruption.
Beware the Worship of False Idols!
I use the word ‘worship’ deliberately. We now live in a world where the peer-reviewed ‘scientific study’ has replaced scripture, and computer modelers have become our modern-day prophets.
Challenging mainstream scientific ‘facts’ invokes in others no less offense than the religious blasphemy of previous times.
Nobody would seriously doubt anymore that men and women of the cloth are flawed humans capable of sin just like the rest of us. So too must we accept that the new clergy operating within the institutions of modern Science can also be led into temptation.
This is just one reason why me must continue to ask questions! Remain skeptical. Keep on learning… the scientific method demands it of you!
Thanks for reading! Don’t forget to subscribe (if you haven’t already) and share.
-Tristan